Viva Brighton Issue #83 January 2020

BITS AND BUSES
ON THE BUSES #57: CB FRY ROUTE 28
Charles Burgess Fry, known as CB Fry, has been dubbed ‘probably the
most variously gifted Englishman of any age’, by Test Match Special cricket
commentator John Arlott. Born in Croydon in 1872, Fry won a scholarship
and was educated at Oxford, where he was awarded a university ‘blue’
in football, cricket and athletics. Fry won school prizes at Repton in Latin
Verse, Greek Verse and French, and accumulated large debts whilst studying,
leading him to take part in nude modelling to make ends meet.
Fry graduated in 1895, and made his Test debut against South Africa
in 1896. He also played cricket for Sussex from 1894, captaining them
from 1904 to 1908. Fry captained England in his final six Test matches in 1912, and was known as a
brilliant right-handed batsman, scoring 30,886 first-class runs at an average of 50.22. He also played
football as a defender, earning one cap for England and playing in all eight games of Southampton’s
FA cup run, culminating in defeat in the final in 1902.
In later life, Fry ran as a Liberal candidate for the Brighton constituency in 1922, bringing some
‘glamour and excitement’ to the election due to his celebrity, according to biographer Iain Wilton.
He won 22,059 votes but lost out to the Rt Hon. George Clement Tryon. He died in 1956 in
Hampstead, London, aged 84. Joe Fuller
Illustration by Joda (@joda_art)
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